i've been roaming around

my much cooler, and wiser, little sister gave me an awesome budda-ish thought yesterday. she said "basketball is like the sun. it'll always come again." so i'm dealing with my withdrawals and filling my life with other excitement, such as:

a new job (mostly this)
cool friends
pandora (i love that thing)
the wii fit (i love that thing too)
new music (thanks to pandora, and cool friends)
and other assorted things

(i really like lists. and parentheses, apparently.) i have had a plethora of interesting experiences lately that i can't really remember right now, or probably even articulate very well. let's just say boys are crazy and life is fun. and that is all.

great news today though - kyle korver is staying with the jazz! the only thing better would be him coming to phoenix...

many a road, you know

i realized recently that i never posted anything about the finals. probably for a couple of reasons:
a) i hate the lakers
b) i hate kobe
c) i'm sad for dwight
d) i hate the lakers, and kobe

so... i'm going through withdrawals already. basketball season just ended and i have to wait another four months to watch again! (and that's just for the preseason, which is pathetic.) i thought draft day today would be a little bit of a consolation, but it was not as exciting as i expected, because i don't know one blessed thing about college basketball. all in all, it was a weird day. mj died, shaq is going to the clippers, orlando traded courtney lee, that spanish dreamboat is going to minnesota. oh well. life is good, tomorrow is friday, and i'm still cool.

where every hour is blessed

tonight we were invited over to have dinner with some people in my dad's ward, and afterwards we all sat around talking about our dad's. (side note - i already take piano lessons from that lady, but i think i will take some hostess lessons from her as well. she throws a mean dinner party.) as i sat listening to all the stories about dads, i realized one thing - a good father has a never-ending influence.

i am so thankful to have a good dad - someone who supports me, who teaches me, who counsels me, who guides me, who worries about me, who understands me, who makes me laugh, who is a good example. and i'm thankful for grandpas who have done the same. happy father's day to you all, and thanks. so much.

it's all the same

i thought i would update you all on my summer project.
so far, i have 119 done, and approximately 78 days to finish the other 881. which means i need to fold about 12 per day. (i almost didn't do all that math, because i was scared of the number that would come out. but 12 is not that bad - totally doable.)

(oh, and an extra bit of asian-ness in the background - my mom bought me some canned lychee when i was at her house. i'm saving it for a special occasion. and if anyone knows where i could find some fresh ones, i would be willing to make some kind of deal to get that information.)

he's got style

when ragan and i were longboarding last week, i made a startling discovery...

this caterpillar was living on a leaf that ragan oh so kindly picked for me. and since i am a lot wimpy, i screamed and dropped it when i discovered it. luckily for the caterpillar, it landed on my board and ragan used his mad skills to pick it up. we stopped and gently placed it on this leaf, hoping it would live to see many more longboarders come through (and maybe turn into a beautiful butterfly). i hope it wasn't too traumatized to make that happen.

later that day -

i felt something crawling around down near my navel area while i was eating dinner. i discreetly tried to investigate and didn't see anything, and the sensation stopped, so i just kept living life. about two hours later, i felt it again. and this time when i investigated, i found this lost little ladybug. i pulled her out, let her crawl around on my arm, and then let her go back outside to find her family.

i remember when we lived in texas and we were washing the cars for family home evening one night. i was sitting around, not really helping, when a ladybug came and landed on my arm, just for fun. of course i was excited and told everyone about it, and my dad said it landed on me because i was as beautiful as a flower. isn't that nice of him?

normally, i don't love bugs (especially spiders) but these two kinds are probably the most tolerable and least likely to freak me out. if i had to have insect encounters, i'm glad it was with these two lovely bugs.

oh say say say

i have returned safely from utah with everything marked off of my checklist:

wedding - check

sushi - check

picture taking - check

catching up - check

(i was right, though, and didn't get enough in. kira, stephanie, karen, i'm so sorry i didn't call! suddenly i was back in arizona. next time, for sure.)

also, i got one extra thing in - longboarding. ragan was nice enough to take me for the first time ever, and i even got some battle wounds. a-like this...

all in all, it was a pretty successful trip. i think one way to measure the amount of fun you are having is how fast time goes, and i can't believe how quickly those three days flew by. it felt like about three seconds.

waiting here with hopes

last monday i went golfing again. my second time ever, and i killed it. (for those of you who don't know, that means i did awesome. just in case there was any doubt.) disbelieving? i drove to the green, on multiple par 3's (which is pretty short, i know. but i was using a 6 iron, not even a driver, and i'm a wimp.)

last thursday i went to the cannery. totally awesome. i got to wear some stellar yellow gloves and put the jars into the cooling tunnel. i felt like an important part of something great. (i just tried to ignore the fact that i was one of two people doing a one person job. they had a plethora of volunteers that day, i think, and were making up jobs.)

last friday i made sugar cookie dough to surprise my dad. and then i remembered our oven is broken, and not able to bake the sugar cookie dough i slaved over for about seven minutes. luckily it won't die in the freezer.

last saturday i got to hang out with jessi, had a piano recital (in which i also killed it) and got to watch some "arrested development" with some fun people i didn't know and some fun people i have only known for a little while. and basically had a really spectacular day. (except for the part where i cried a little about the cavs losing. but dwight howard is cool, and i think the magic have as good a chance to beat the lakers as those cavs, if not a better one. i think i was mostly crying at my failure to make a good prediction.)

today i got some potentially good news, and got some potentially not so good news.

this thursday i will be flying up to utah, and starting a great weekend which will include a wedding (on saturday), some sushi (it will happen this time), some picture taking (sadly overdue), some catching up (which i already know i will not get enough of) and a sunday of driving with some cool people. i can't wait!